Save You {Liam Dunbar #2}

TOO CLOSE TO HOME

One Year Ago

"Do you ever wish we never moved to Beacon Hills?"

Isabelle had been silently sitting on Allison's bed waiting for her get ready, so Allison was caught off guard by the random question.

"What?" she turned away from her mirror, where she'd been putting in a pair of earrings. Isabelle was crossed-legged on the edge of her bed, wringing her hands together anxiously.

"I mean, it wasn't perfect before, I know that..." Isabelle spoke quickly. "But we always had nice things, a nice place to live, we had mom and dad...things were okay."

"Again...what?" Allison repeated with a surprised laugh. "Where is all this coming from?" They had just gotten back from France and were starting their first day of school—Allison her junior year and Isabelle her sophomore. "Are you nervous about school are something?"

"Huh?" Isabelle looked up at her sister with a wrinkled nose. "No, I could care less—I'm just..." she paused to take a deep breath. "I'm just worried about what's going to happen next and what's already happened and how our lives would be if we never came to this damn town." She looked up at Allison when she was done talking and saw a bewildered expression on her face.

"Iz, it's seven a.m.," Allison finally said, shaking her head. "Why are you thinking about all of this?"

Isabelle bit her lip roughly and shook her head.

"I...I don't know," she murmured. Allison sat beside her slowly and glanced down at Isabelle's hands, which were still anxiously tangled in her lap. Allison set one of her own steady hands on Isabelle's, making her look up.

"I don't think it's worth thinking about this hard," she gave her answer. "Life was pretty good before we moved here, but the real world—our family's world—would've caught up to us eventually and everything still would've changed."

"Besides," she continued. "Think of all the people we've met—"

"--because of the supernatural," Isabelle cut in with a light eye roll. "Do you really think we'd be as close as we are to any of our friends if they weren't all supernatural creatures?"

"We were friends with them before we knew," Allison shrugged. "It just brought us closer."

Isabelle thought back with a slow nod, then smiled. Allison smiled too, knowing that they were in agreement.

"I just don't want to lose anyone else," Isabelle whispered with a shaky laugh. "I wish we could always stay in France and pretend."

"Pretend what?"

"Pretend that we're normal," Isabelle answered with a hopeful smile. "Like we're two girls with our whole lives ahead of us. Seeing the world and soaking every good thing we can. Pretend that we're calling Lydia for normal girl talk and not to ask how she's handling her were...kanima...ex-boyfriend. That we don't want to go back to school because we hate homework, not because we're scared of what's going to come after us this year."

Allison frowned worriedly at her, wondering how long Isabelle had been stressing over this and why she hadn't noticed it sooner.

"I know it's been hard," she said after a moment. Isabelle shot her a glance and she sighed. "It's been really hard."

"But..." she said in a louder voice, tugging Isabelle's arm so they were eye-to-eye. "We got through it. We've gotten through everything life has thrown at us, and somehow we got through it. We've gotten through the worst, and things can only get better from here."